Inversions, Harmonics, and Exercises

I have a son who always has been the most communicative of the three of our offspring. The other two talk to us on a "need to know" basis, and in general, they do not think we need to know much ordinary stuff from their days. Number Three Son, however, was a chatterbox as a child, and has turned into a man who likes to talk to me. This quirk in his personality means that now that he is a college student, and since he is studying music, I am at last getting the music theory education I always wanted but never pursued for myself. Or, to be more precise, he is getting the education, and I am getting the fallout. How much fallout depends on how determined he is to explain himself after I say, "That hurts my head. It sounded like terms I understand, but I have no clue what you just said." He thinks this is very funny.

Anyway, I am picking up just enough from him so that I can almost see the structure of what I have always called "chords." These musical sounds are combination sounds - several notes at once, with the notes cooperating together in a specified way. In "solfège," which is the "do, re, mi" way of singing or playing a scale (like the von Trapps and their governess did - remember? Do, a deer, a female deer?") if you play the notes of do, mi, and so, all at the same time, you have a "I" (one) chord. Or, that's what I have always thought - apparently, what you have is a triad with the root as its base and not an inversion of the triad. Whatever.

The reason I am bringing this up is because it has come to me that this is a good metaphor for my life right now. My life has become so fully about a few specifically chosen things which function together in a specified way, that it is as if I am living in chords - triads - inversions - variations on a harmonic theme. And it works. This is music.

And the thing that surprises me is that all the notes are playing at the same time. When I first learned to play the piano, I learned to practice one hand at a time, practice with a metronome, practice very very slowly until I could do it consistently, and then only gradually come up to tempo. Work on the finger exercises until they were part of muscle memory. Take great pains to learn it right because unlearning was so horrible.

I figured out that life works that way too. In order to function well, it is necessary to play one hand at at time. Focus. Stop trying to play too much too fast too soon.

What I did not know is that it is possible to concentrate on the parts so well for so long that eventually a whole sonata breaks through. The undertones of mystery, longing, worship, communion ... the strong and purposeful rhythms of a daily life - of cooking, cleaning, washing, ironing, folding, polishing, arranging, experimenting ... the barely perceptible building of tempo and breadth and complication in a life of intellectual pursuits ... the artistry of crescendo and decrescendo, movements, counterpoint, paint or needle and thread or words ... all at once, just when I thought the finger exercises had exhausted my ability to listen, it comes together and makes music. And it is beautiful.